A Death in the Family

A Death in the Family:

My wife's father is dead, having passed away in a peaceful sleep while sitting in his favorite chair. I have mentioned him here from time to time, but I would like to give him a proper eulogy.

He joined in the Army in 1946, as a young officer and navigator on bombers. He served in the Army Air Force and then the Air Force. He was stationed in Germany at the beginning of the postwar period, when the Werewolves were still active. He was charged with guarding the payroll for his unit, a perilous duty at the time.

Later he was stationed in Libya, where he and his unit fought bandits attempting to raid military supplies. He left the military in the 1950s, and became an aerospace engineer for General Motors' defense contracting sections. During that time he worked on numerous secret programs, and was one of the designers of the Stealth program.

He took the usual oaths to keep our country's secrets, and kept them faithfully. Even in his seventies, talking to me in our occasional chats on national defense and policy, he never revealed any of the secrets -- many long obsolete -- that he had promised to keep.

In his youth he had fierce red hair and an Irish temper, and sailed the Carribean as an officer of the United States' Power Squadrons; in his age, his hair had turned to white, and to me he was always a perfect gentleman. When I asked for his daughter's hand, he smiled and told me he had no objections, but that he had raised her to make her own decisions.

I liked him and I'll miss him. He was a fine man.